The Roundup: Fall 2015 Volume 7

In this week’s installment…

Osomatsu tries to handle a murder mystery and it goes about as well as you’d expect, Dance With Devils takes itself slightly less serious for like 30 seconds, Miss Monochrome discovers the bonding power of Swan paddle boats, and after 8 episodes of behaving Owarimonogatari has to let out its pervy side a bit.

Mr. Osomatsu
Episode 8: “The Calming Osomatsu/Totoko’s Dream”

Artemis: Is it just me, or has a lot of the original energy and vibrancy of Osomatsu-san really dissipated over the last few episodes? I miss that fast-paced exuberance and snappy sense of humour, a lot of which seems to have vanished after episode 5 in favour of the much watered-down gags involving side-characters like Totoko and Iyami. In all fairness though, I can’t blame only these characters for bringing down the general tone of the show – the first half of this episode wasn’t exactly stellar either, and not just thanks to the repetitive Iyami cracks. Osomatsu-san often straddles that line between blatantly dumb and surprisingly clever, but unfortunately it tipped the balance way towards the former this week by wasting a potentially great idea on a bunch of disappointingly weak jokes. I really think this series would do better to focus on the Matsuno brothers and how they function (or dysfunction) as a family as opposed to these other very hit-and-miss sketches that sometimes do very little but fill up empty space.

Jel: Despite the lack of any emotional punch or meaningful commentary, I still had fun with this episode. Osomatsu himself was pretty obnoxious in the first half but that was kind of the point. I was more amused by the bait and switch killer joke and the fact that this show is willing to indiscriminately kill hundreds of people to get a laugh. The second half felt like we were re-treading the same ground from Totoko’s last appearance, although it was almost saved by Jyushimatsu’s “menacing” face and well, just the fact that he exists. Definitely not Osomatsu at its best but I enjoyed it.

Dance With Devils – RAINBOWS (and at least one unicorn)

Dance with Devils
Episode 8: “Waltz of Transience”

Artemis: Well, there go all my dreams for a Ritsuka/Azuna pairing, so that’s too bad. I’m probably more upset about this than the thought of Azuna actually dying, because let’s face it, she didn’t exactly get a whole lot of character development. But hey, on the bright side, Ritsuka got to share a romantic dance (with rainbows!) with Rem-sama, and Rem-sama scowled a lot but otherwise refrained from being a creep. I think I’ll put his generally frosty demeanour down to daddy issues (which I guess would be fair considering his father is an abusive giant eyeball or whatever), so I’ve more or less made my peace that this is likely going to be the canon relationship of the series. At this point, pretty much anyone is preferable to Shiki – and considering the rest of the cast consists of the likes of a half-vampire with a sister complex, a womanizer who enjoys literally hypnotising his harem, and a Pomeranian with severe boundary issues, that’s saying quite a lot.

Jel: Finally, an extremely convenient plot device to force Ritsuka and Rem together! I could question why the Student Council keeps playing along with the school thing now that they found the grimoire, but who cares about that: we got a song and dance with RAINBOWS. Interesting that this episode was probably the first time Dance with Devils dialed the serious meter down to 90% of it’s usual 110%, but they could only hold back so long before offing poor Azuna. It’s sad she died and all but it was hard to get too worked up considering how little we knew about her. I’d also like to note that her and Nii-san have done a TERRIBLE job protecting Ritsuka to this point, so other than making Ritsuka flip out I don’t think she’ll be missed much.

Miss Monochrome – The Animation Season 3
Episode 9: “Unity”

Jel: I kind of like the idea of Monochrome as the tough lovin’ Senpai, although I’m not sure it really fits her character. She’s been shown to be singularly focused on her goal of being the top idol, including not trusting Caramel in the past. I was thoroughly convinced that was going to be the case here, but clearly I was wrong. Maybe she’s learned valuable life lessons from her weird companions like Battery-kun and Tuna Guy? I’m actually relieved as so many other people have double crossed Monochrome as it is, it’s nice that she gets to keep some friends for once.

Owarimonogatari – Yotsugi has quietly become the best character

Owarimonogatari
Episode 8: “Shinobu Mail, Part 2”

Jel: I really, really hope Mayoi doesn’t come back but I know in my heart it is going to happen. The fact that her “power” seems to be active is evidence enough for me. I was also really feeling the effects of Monogatari’s random timeline jumping. I’m having a hard time remembering how Shinobu got separated and I’m too lazy to go back and refresh my memory, so finding her didn’t quite have as much punch as I think it was supposed to. That being said, I’m liking all this action happening, at least by this series’ standards. I also like how they highlighted how capable Kanbaru is, even beyond her Monkey Paw powers. Maybe we’ll get a cool fight scene with this new Rainy Devil? Final note: Yotsugi is secretly the best, fight me. They went in a little too hard on the foot fetish thing though.

Post navigation

4 thoughts on “The Roundup: Fall 2015 Volume 7”

With the removal of episodes in Osomatsu-san, I speculate the writers were told to tone it down somewhat. Regardless, my go-to comedy (and consistently excellent show) this season still remains YuruYuri.

Osomatsusan has definitely lost it’s edge. It could be due to the early episode rewrites and the staff playing it safe but I think it’s also just a natural effect of ideas running thin (literaly and figuratively). Either way a first half that ends with a pile of corpses is pretty decent but ultimately annoying.

We’ll talk more about it later, but this week’s episode was fantastic. I think just the loose format of the show means you’re going to get some good and some bad, but wow when this show at its best it makes it totally worth it.